


Flashback: The Trouble With Mercurians

by fadeverb



Series: Kai and Mannie [16]
Category: In Nomine
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-23 22:14:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/931668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fadeverb/pseuds/fadeverb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hari has a hobby, and it doesn't always end well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flashback: The Trouble With Mercurians

"You're going to owe me for this one," Mannie said. He put one hand to the bloody streak along Hari's head, and sang healing. "If you feel obliged to seduce anything with a pretty face that happens to cross your path, so be it, but stay away from the Host."

"If you think I'm going to take on any Geas--"

"Strictly informal," Mannie said. He grimaced, and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe the blood off his fingers. "I could have ignored your call, you know. I was in the middle of an experiment I'll have to start from scratch. Though I'll admit the sheer novelty of hearing you screaming for help inside my head was enough to make me curious. Did you somehow fail to realize that she was an angel?"

"No," Hari said. "I knew."

#

She'd been one of a mass of nurses at the hospital, a minor obstacle to watch for and avoid if necessary, until he'd heard the gentle chime of disturbance from one of the wards as he passed. Careful investigation narrowed down the possibilities until he was sure of which nurse it had been.

She had a very pretty face.

The way she reacted to his flirting removed certain possibilities, and an arranged encounter with two of his rougher servants in a dark alley confirmed his suspicions. She didn't strike back once, sang them into a slumber, and fled. Once he knew she was a Mercurian, he couldn't resist.

#

"I see. And you were planning on telling me _when_?"

"When it became relevant," Hari said, and shrugged. "I'm going to need another dose, at the very least. Possibly two."

"Which I'll be spacing out far enough apart to make sure the disturbance doesn't travel far. In case you hadn't noticed, there's something of an aggressive presence outside looking for you, and I'd rather not be caught in that wake. Or would you prefer to call in one of your underlings to do this for you? I'd love to hear you explain this story to them." His brother collapsed into an armchair, pulled out some pad of paper to begin scribbling on. "Once again, you've thrown off my schedule without even _trying_."

"So very sorry," Hari said. He sat down in the armchair opposite, no matter that the fabric would be left stained. "Next time I'll try to arrange attacks on my person more conveniently for your schedule."

"Or you could avoid them in the first place," Mannie said, not looking up. "Have you gone and compromised our Roles, then?"

#

The city was large enough that minor nobility could blend into an undistinguishable mass easily enough, and she seemed content to leave him a mystery. Resonating her would have been dangerous, but he'd had plenty of opportunity to learn the handling--without resonance use--of people touchier and more suspicious. He took his time, pushed her gently in the correct direction, and was rewarded with the expected response.

Angels were easier to manipulate that humans, sometimes. They didn't have the same set of prejudices, knew how to shield themselves from little matters of public opinion. He took to speaking with her in private, meeting now and then for...discussions. Mostly discussions. Theology and philosophy and politics, nothing more serious than any young aristocrat might play at debating.

She had a pleasant figure, an easy laugh, and no head for arguments. He won their little debates more often than not, took care to pretend at losing a few. There was a delight in seeing how she began to more quickly grasp his neatly laid paths of logic. And that she told no one about them, no one at all.

#

"Possibly," Hari said, pragmatism finally beating out shame. "While I didn't speak of my Role.... Well. She is a Mercurian. It's difficult to say how much she might have picked up on."

"More good news. If my day becomes any better, I may die of sheer joy." Mannie flipped to another sheet of paper, and shouted, "Children!"

A clatter on the stairs turned into two small boys, who lingered in the doorway. "We were playing with the kittens," mumbled the smaller boy, and the older one cuffed him casually across the face.

"Yes, father?" The older child had a lingering smile, and wet sleeves.

"Go take the cook's child out to the garden, and play. Somewhere you can be easily seen by passersby. Play...politely. Keep an eye out for any strangers who stop to watch for long, or linger too near the house. And don't break anything, or I'll have you tossed back to Hell and acquire a gremlin who can be more careful, understood?"

The two of them nodded quickly, and clattered away.

"Now," said Mannie, once those two were well out of ear-shot, "do you want to explain to me precisely why you believed this was a good idea? I know you're not stupid, but you're certainly looking the fool now. Give me a glimmer of enlightenment. What reason did you have for following a course of action that even those two could name as idiotic?"

#

He'd let her win two arguments, and then found she was dancing lightly about every point he put forward on a third. A quiet night in her little apartment, the one she shared with some unnamed roommate he'd never met, theoretical chaperone for an unmarried young woman of reasonable prospects. He was doing her an honor in being there, and having his cultivated words so easily dodged grew...irritating.

And so, in a fit of frustration, he threw a wave of obsessive affection at her, to move the evening on to more useful activities.

The Mercurian smiled up at him sweetly. She said, in a low voice, "I had always wondered..."

And threw him into the wall.

#

"What I do in my own time is no business of yours," Hari said. He wondered, as Mannie stood up, but it was only to sing another wave of healing. "Besides," he added, in a conciliatory tone (because the ring he wore had turned a deep red), "Mercurians are so _easy_ to push. It's hard to resist giving it a try."

"Perhaps there's some looming Impudite scarcity, which no one has seen fit to inform me of," Mannie said, seating himself again. "Or were you planning on engaging in some project that would require vast Essence resources? Trying to study the effects of Falling on your average Servitor of War?"

"I didn't know she was a Mercurian of War."

"Obviously. Would you have tried the same game if you had known? Who did you _think_ she was serving?"

Hari hadn't given much thought to the matter. One Mercurian was much like another. Weak, helpless against humans, easily swayed by gentle smiles until they'd slipped so far there was no chance of recovery. "Does it matter now?"

#

"How interesting," she said, as he picked himself up from the floor. "This _will_ be exciting." And while he was still composing a suitable response, slapped him across the face, hard enough to throw him into the wall again.

He sent a wave of emptiness at her, and she shrugged it off as if it were nothing at all. "That's one of the problems with demons," she said, and watched him struggle up, a playful smile on her face. The same expression she'd worn when they'd argued over politics and both known it to be a game. "You fledge at seven Forces, and so by the time you hit nine or ten, you imagine yourselves to be so...powerful. Forgetting that the youngest angel starts with nine. Little Habbalite, do you want to guess how many Forces I have?"

The next swipe caught him for all that he was trying to back away, and she stood in the doorway before him. He took advantage of the combat to send off a single, desperate message to his brother, hoped she'd take the disturbance for nothing more than the damage being done to the room.

Taking to celestial form seemed unwise, in her presence.

#

"Of course it matters," Mannie snapped. "Because having learned the response from a Mercurian of that Word, you might try the novel concept of learning from experience, to not make the same mistake again. Ideally, there wouldn't _be_ an again, but I'm not optimistic."

Footsteps clattered towards them, and the younger of the two boys stood in the door, bouncing on his heels. "Pardon me," he said, breathlessly, "but there's strangers lurking about. Outside. We two made sure they only got to have a good look at the cook's girl, so they're not like to note much, but they have a fierce glare to them when they look at people."

"Bring your brother inside, and go back to playing elsewhere. Quietly. And stay sharp, understood?" Mannie didn't spare a glance for the child.

"Yes, sir." The boy ran off again, haphazard scampering in the style of one never entirely accustomed to movement on two feet.

"If you've brought a pack of Malakim down on these Roles--"

"Of course not," Hari said, more confidently than he felt. "They'll pass through the area, looking for me, and once I'm not found they'll leave. I'll keep to the lab for a few days, and be cautious until I'm sure they're well out of the way." He curled one hand into a fist, and saw the lingering red mark down his arm. "You seem prepared to deal with any of the Host who happen to show up at the door."

"Yes," Mannie said. "But I would rather not."

#

She was absurdly beautiful when she was throwing him against things, and as cheerful as she'd ever been in one of their conversations, or at the bedside of a patient needing to be coaxed into good spirits. She was _toying_ with him, waiting for him to stand up before she struck again. He'd never thought it worth packing weaponry to these meetings, and was beginning to regret the decision.

"What did you think I was?" she asked, as he wiped blood out of his eyes. "A Servitor of Stone or Flowers, that I would never strike first? Or maybe that because of my Choir, I'd never strike at all. My Lord knows that even his most peaceful servants need to defend themselves." She smiled down at him. "I think we're nearly done with this game, don't you? Though it _was_ entertaining while it lasted." She had a small bruise on her face, from the one time he'd managed to hit her, and nothing more to show for the fight than that. Even her hair was still neatly braided and pinned in place.

Disturbance howled around the two of them, and the door exploded.

He couldn't see anything through the smoke, couldn't hear through the noise, but one hand grabbed his, a burst of Song pulled his fractured arm back into something reliable again, and he followed, running, where he was taken. Was gratified to hear another explosion as they pounded down the rickety staircase, and if burning down an apartment complex might leave the city ringing with disturbance, it was preferable to the alternative.

"You idiot," said his brother, as they ran. "What were you doing?"

#

"I can only spend so much time preparing explosions for your benefit," Mannie said. "If you might recall, lab security is designed to secure the _lab_. Not your...hobbies."

"I'll be less direct, next time," Hari said. More to himself than to the other. "Far more efficient to send in Hellsworn and let them take any injury, do the Mercurian more damage beside. Less entertaining that way, but more effective."

"Have you even been listening to me?" Mannie stood up. "Of course you haven't. You never learn. But you owe me, and here's how I expect payment: come to the lab and do your own work for once. For a week, if you can concentrate for that long. We're falling behind schedule, and I'm not about to let the reward we know is waiting slip away because you can't be bothered to put in your share."

"You need to learn to delegate, Mannie." Hari followed along, turning over plans and strategies in his mind. If one experiment failed, it was simply time to try a new approach.

And Mercurians were so...entertaining.


End file.
